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PROGRESSIVE JUDAISM IN THE NEWS

New Era Begins: SAUPJ Gathers in Cape Town for Biennial Conference

The SAUPJ(South African Union for Progressive Judaism) biennial conference, which took place at Cape Town’s Temple Israel from June 6-8, 2014, heralded a new era for the community. The gathering marked the end of Steve Lurie’s 10-year tenure as SAUPJ Chair. In his place, the Conference selected Alvin Kushner as SAUPJ’s new Chair. Kushner is a member of Temple Israel and has served in numerous positions, both in the Temple and on the SAUPJ national board.

The WUPJ’s Vice President for International Development Rabbi Joel Oseran noted, “The SAUPJ and the WUPJ have been blessed to have had the caliber of leadership provided by Steve Lurie during his long and distinguished service to Progressive Judaism nationally and internationally. We owe him and Rahle, who has been at his side always, our profound gratitude.”

The Conference program was chock full of sessions aimed at developing Jewish education and strengthening Jewish commitment so as to support democracy, freedom, tolerance and compassion.

The ‘Biblical References to the Importance of Unity in Diversity’ was a Conference highlight, as was the ‘What do we Want from the Future SAUPJ in an Ideal World’ round table group and plenary session.

Rabbi Oseran led sessions on Israel and World Jewry while Director of JHub and former head of the Reform Movement in the UK Rabbi Shoshana Boyd Gelfand served as scholar in residence for the Conference and gave sessions on leadership and group dynamics.

Parsha Noah by Rabbi MargolisSometimes change comes upon us in a flood without warning. On other occasions we are warned, but donâ€™t take heed of that inner voice giving us the preverbal heads-up. If we are to succeed in our endeavours and our future, we would do well to pay close attention to those little warnings life provides us with.

Exploring mind, body and soul at Netzer SA Winter Camp Chakirah.
Kathryn Henning, Netzer SA National Rosh Chinuch
Pennington Beach, Durban. 1-9 July 2013.What a wonderful camp filled with laugher, smiling and growing! We had such a blast learning about all the cool things in Netzer, and actually getting down to the fun stuff. Hereâ€™s a little update (as posted live at the end of each day) as to what went down on Machaneh Chakirah â€“ Lets Go Exploring!

Day One:
What a crazy, busy day here in Pennington!
Early this morning we all indulged in delicious pancakes before heading off to some group bonding activities and obstacle courses. We overcame many fears throughout the day and did some rock climbing and zip lining. We spent the rest of the day eating chocolate, singing, praying and learning about our ideology and being a Maddie(leader) in Netzer!
Now itâ€™s time for a night of chilling out in the wilderness!

Day Two:
We are proud to say that we are tired but also excited!
We took a trip down the road to the beach and enjoyed a relaxing few hours before getting back to learning.

Day Three:
We delved into our personal ideology, and learnt about the different focuses an ideology could have and did some drama games to learn how to project, speak and lead with Spontaneous Hadracha (leadership).
We finished off our day with a Maâ€™amad (creative prayer service) and a delicious stew to warm us up!

Day Four:
Early this morning we walked to the beach to take part in welcoming Reese Joseph, one of our Channichim (participants), into the Jewish tribe. With her Batmitzvah just a few weeks away, we were lucky enough to take part in her Mikveh Ceremony on the beach, as part of her conversion process.

Day Six:
Saturday started with a bit of a sleep-in and a â€œChoose Your Own Adventureâ€ Maâ€™amad. The rest of the day has been pretty chilled and weâ€™re all feeling rejuvenated and ready for the new week, jam packed with learning and friends before school starts again.Mazkirut note: It has been an unexpectedly special Winter Camp with our Young Leaders inspiring us and making us proud through how much they have grown and learnt!

Day Seven:
A really productive day today with Netzer South Africa. Our Mazkirut and oldest age group â€“ Keshet â€“ have been hard at work over the past six months preparing proposals for their Vaâ€™adot. Today we finished the first two of our Kinnus Sessions, where we discussed and changed the way we vote and spoke in-depth about Shabbat and how to make it a special occasion on Camp. We are also in the process of adding new and creative ways to do Birkat Haâ€™mazon.
Weâ€™ve made a lot of progress in changing some of our year-long policies and camp policies for Summer Machaneh. We look forward to implementing the changes we have made to our Tâ€™filah policy throughout the year and on Camp.

To end off the day, Kinnus was followed by an amazing connectivity themed Maâ€™amad..

THE Durban Progressive Jewish community plays a prominent role in a provincial interfaith council, whose mission is to improve service delivery to the poor.

The KwaZulu Natal Inter-Religious Council, launched in October 2007, began when Premier Sbusiso Ndebele invited the province’s religious leaders to join a partnership to redress social ills such as poverty, unemployment, HIV/AIDS, lack of housing, education and clean water, and the high levels of crime and violence.

The council brings together eight faiths: Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Bahai, African Traditional and Nazareth Baptists. The Jewish representative on the council is Rabbi Hillel Avidan, chair of the SA Association of Progressive Rabbis. Also active are Paddy Meskin, who heads the council’s Secretariat, and Professor Antony Arkin.

Premier Ndebele hoped the religious leaders would buy into a plan of action which he had already worked out. But, as explained by council chairman Wilfrid Cardinal Napier, the religious leaders felt that “with the wisdom gained from a similar partnership at national level, more was needed to play a meaningful role. For instance the co-ordination of current and future efforts would be essential.”

The process of establishing a body to co-ordinate the religious leaders took almost two years “due to the need for us to get to know and understand each other,” said Cardinal Napier. “A high degree of sensitivity was needed for this.”

Paddy Meskin plays a key role in setting up eight task forces which will do the actual work of the council. The eight task forces are poverty and skills building; moral regeneration; environnment; HIV and AIDS; education; youth; crime and violence; and advocacy and media. More than a hundred religious leaders from different faiths have already signed up to help with the task forces.

Training workshops for members of the task forces will commence in the first few months of 2008, as will fund-raising initiatives.

The council has enjoyed extensive media coverage in KwaZulu Natal, both print and radio. As a result, a flood of inquiries have come in, including calls from some 300 schools for help with workshops.

The council will also forge ties with similar bodies on the African continent. There are some 22 similar inter-faith councils on the continent, under the umbrella of the African Council of Religious Leaders, whose Secretary General, Dr Mustafa Ali, was guest speaker at the KZN launch.

All together now. Council members hold hands in a circle at their first meeting after the launch. The chairman, Wilfrid, Cardinal Napier, is at bottom left. The SAUPJ’s Paddy Meskin is two places to his left, and Professor Antony Arkin is at the top right.

THE Cape Town Jewish community celebrated Israel’s 60th anniversary in a long week of events in which Netzer was proud to play an important role.The week began with moving Yom-Hasho’ah and Yom Hazikaron ceremonies, followed by a huge Yom Haâ€™atzmaut ceremony, together with the entire Jewish community, at the Ratanga Junction Theme Park.

The Netzer team wore their new green shirts, and carried their blue flags. They sold curry & rice at their Netzer stall, marched inside the venue with their flags and with great “ruach”, and even went on stage to perform a memorable dance number.

And that’s not all: less than 24 hours later, the movement held a special “Yom Ha’atzmaut Ceremony” in the Green Point shul for the entire community, followed by an “Israel@60” sleepover at the Wynberg shul.

THE South African Union for Progressive Judaism and Netzer celebrated Yom Haâ€™atzmaut with the rest of the Johannesburg Jewish community at the Wanderers Cricket Stadium on Wednesday night, 7th May 2008.Both the SAUPJ and Netzer were part of the procession of Jewish organisations and youth movements. Those who joined the procession through the stadium included Steve Lurie, SAUPJ chairperson; Rabbi Robert Jacobs (Bet David, Sandton); Moira Holz and Simon Hochschild (Temple Emanuel, Parktown); Rabbi Ann Folb (Bet Menorah, Pretoria); and Netzer shaliach Michael Szczupak.Rabbi Ann Folb, Moira Holz and (right) Steve Lurie

THE United Sisterhood is in serious need of financial assistance to avoid closing its Jewish Family Assistance Fund.The United Sisterhood, which will celebrate 75 years of helping the underprivileged in August this year, may have to cut down on supporting projects and people it has assisted for many years, and may have to close the Jewish Family Assistance Fund.

The reason for the lack of funds is varied, but neither the Jewish Family Assistance Fund nor the United Sisterhood have suffered from any maladministration or from any misuse or misappropriation of funds. Neither fund has any outstanding creditors.

The economic situation in South Africa has hit Jewish community, and many former regular donors are finding it more and more difficult to cope themselves with inflation. In addition, the Johannesburg Jewish community has become an aging community. Even though interest rates have risen, possibly giving our senior members more income from investments, the cost of living has increased way beyond this income. Their contributions to our Tikkun Olam programmes have either stopped or have been drastically reduced.

Another spin-off of the rising cost of living has been that the number of people in need has risen. Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) has also meant that more and more older white South Africans have been retrenched and cannot find employment.

The United Sisterhood is unique in that it does not ask what colour people in need are, nor does it ask the gender of these people, nor does it ask them what religion they follow. It asks merely what the need is, and how best to address that need.

Should the United Sisterhood not raise the required amount, the results will be as follows:

For the first time in 62 years, we will not be able to give the educators at MC Weiler School an end-of-year “thank you” party;

For the first time in 62 years, we will not be able to give the learners at MC Weiler School an end-of-year party pack;

For the first time in 62 years, we will not be able to give the outstanding achievers at MC Weiler School a prize (which is normally part of their school uniform for the coming year);

For the first time in 62 years, we will have to stop helping the many orphaned learners at the MC Weiler School with the provision of uniforms;

For the first time in 22 years, we will not be able to give a prize to an outstanding achiever at the Mitzvah School;

For the first time in 12 years, we will not be able to give the learners of the New Nation School an end-of-year party pack;

For the first time in decades, we will have to reduce the special (and very expensive) food we give to the HIV/AIDS sufferers at the MC Weiler and New Nation Schools.

In addition to the above, the United Sisterhood render the following services:

We provide 150 street people with a meal every weekend;

We feed 2 500 learners every day;

We provide a number of learners and educators at both the MC Weiler and New Nation Schools with weekly food parcels;

We give specially formulated, highly nutritional breakfasts to hundreds of ill learners at both the MC Weiler and New Nation Schools;

We provide a minimum of 36 Jewish families with food parcels and food vouchers every week;

We pay for rental, utilities, food, education, transport and other essential needs for a minimum of 15 Jewish families every month;

We help with the tertiary education of a minimum of five learners;

We provide casual employment for a minimum of four single, unemployed mothers;

We provide a monthly lunch for approximately 60 elderly Jewish folk;

We provide monthly entertainment for the patients at Tara hospital;

We provide monthly “goody” bags for the HIV/AIDS babies at Sizwe hospital;

We provide magazines, playing cards and craft materials for the adult TB patients at Sizwe hospital;

We provide transport to and from hospital for the aged Jews living in Hillbrow, Berea and Yeoville so that they can obtain their monthly life-giving medication.

We have provided these humanitarian services for many decades. We will have to stop doing all of this unless we raise sufficient funds to do so. Please help us to help all these people!

ABOVE: Ellen Appleton, past chairperson of the United Sisterhood, with children at the New Nation school.LEFT: Children at the MC Weiler School on prize-giving day

UNITED SISTERHOOD OFFICESInside the grounds of Temple Emanuel, corner Oxford Road and Third Avenue, Parktown.

The founder of Progressive Judaism, Rabbi MC Weiler, encouraged the women who attended his services to form a sisterhood where they would work for the movement and the community at large. That was the beginning of the SA Union of Temple Sisterhoods

TWO British youngsters who recently finished high school, have embarked on a round-the-world trip to visit branches of the youth movement Netzer, and aim to join South African Netzer at their December youth camps in Cape Town.

J.J. Silverman and Dan Raanan, youth leaders in Britain’s Reform movement, have embarked on a six-month journey to visit branches of Netzer Olami, the Progressive movement’s international Zionist youth movement, on six continents. Silverman grew up at Maidenhead Synagogue in Berkshire, while Raanan’s family belongs to Sinai Synagogue in Leeds.

“Whilst trying to decide what to do with our gap year,” they said in the newsletter of Britain’s Movement for Reform Judaism, “we concluded that a year in Israel wasn’t adventurous enough for us. We wanted to stay in touch with the movement at the same time as traveling the world, and what better way than to meet with all the Netzer branches throughout the world?”

As their plans gained momentum, Silverman and Raanan made contact with every branch affiliated with Netzer, and their itinerary grew to include stops in Europe, Israel, South Africa, Australia, South America and the U.S.

“We are looking forward to learning all about the different Reform Jewish customs from around the world,” they wrote, “especially from summer camps in both South Africa and Australia. We hope that our trip will strengthen the connections between us and Reform synagogues around the world, and [that] we inspire the world to come a little closer.”

(Edited extract from an article on the World Union for Progressive Judaism website).

THE World Union for Progressive Judaism has called for emergency funding to help the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism (IMPJ), which has been hard hit by the current global economic downturn and devalued US dollar, forcing it to make massive staff cutbacks.

Reform synagogues, seminaries and rabbinic organizations in the US and Canada have joined in the campaign on behalf of the Israeli movement. An e-mail sent to more than 70 000 leaders of Reform Jewry in North America said:

“We need your help to save the future of the Reform Movement in Israel. Through no fault of its own, the IMPJ has 2 million fewer shekels than originally budgeted, representing more than 30 percent of its funding. To stay afloat, the IMPJ has had to lay off half its staff and has drastically cut back on its operations.”

The timing of this financial crisis is a blow to the increasingly dynamic growth of Progressive Judaism, the branch with which more Israelis identify than Orthodoxy. Many thousands of Israeli Jews are now enjoying this spiritual alternative – through worship, education and social action – thanks to the efforts of dedicated movement staff and volunteers. Their programs and support are now gravely threatened by the current revenue shortfall.

The goal of the appeal is to raise at least $500,000 to alleviate this emergency and sustain the movement. Contributions are being coordinated in the US at www.urj.org/israel/impj.

(Edited extract from an article on the Union for Reform Judaism website).

The World Union for Progressive Judaism is the international umbrella organisation of the Liberal, Progressive and Reconstructionist movements, serving 1 200 congregations with 1.7 million members in 42 countries.